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Chris Lucas is in his first year as coach at West Allegheny, taking over for legendary Bob Palko.
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Goin' Up Camp: New coach Chris Lucas embraces West Allegheny past

Steph Chambers/Post-Gazette

Goin' Up Camp: New coach Chris Lucas embraces West Allegheny past

“Goin’ Up Camp” is a series that offers notes, quotes and anecdotes from district preseason high school football camps.

There’s a new sheriff in town at West Allegheny, but a lot of the deputies are the same.

Chris Lucas is the new coach at West Allegheny, taking over for a veritable legend in Bob Palko, who stepped down after last season, only to take the Mt. Lebanon job a few months later.

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Palko had a 217-73 record in 24 seasons at West Allegheny and won more WPIAL championships (eight) than any coach in league history. The old notion goes something like: “Never follow a legend.”

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But Lucas is embracing the past and also looking to the future, saying he just hopes to continue what Palko built. And he has a small army of former Palko assistants helping him.

Two of Palko’s top assistants (Kim Niedbala and Andy Barry) went with him to Mt. Lebanon. Niedbala was supposed to take over for Palko at West Allegheny, but it didn’t work out, so he left with Palko. But among the assistants who stayed is longtime defensive coordinator Bryan Cornell. Jamie Schumacher, another former Palko assistant, is the new offensive coordinator. Lucas also added a few of his own assistants.

“One of the only reasons I thought about taking the job is because 11 of the guys who were here before stayed,” Lucas said. “You take a job like this after what Coach Palko has done, where things were run like a machine, and come in with a totally new staff? That would be very difficult to do.”

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Lucas was Bishop Canevin’s coach last season and the team’s offensive coordinator before that. But he was an assistant at West Allegheny in 2009 and also was an assistant at Avonworth, Northgate and North Catholic. The 39-year-old is a computer science teacher at West Allegheny.

“There’s no replacing Bob Palko,” Lucas said. “If you came in with that attitude, then you’re setting yourself up for failure. What I have here is being able to lean on all the coaches we have.”

Cornell said, “A lot of the staff is back, and Chris has brought his little flavor. Everything we’ve talked about to the kids is the tradition. The tradition has stayed. We had some great coaches leave. They say that change sometimes is not a bad thing. I really miss the guys who have gone, but you have to move on. This re-energizes you. There’s no question I still have the fire and all is good.”

Championship assistants

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Among the other Palko assistants who stayed are Tim Levcik (former Robert Morris quarterback), Greg Marshall and Mark Capuano. Good ol’ Cap is still coaching. Capuano won a WPIAL title as the head coach at Moon in 1998 and has spent time as an assistant at a few different schools since then.

Another WPIAL championship coach new to the West Allegheny staff this year is Dave Vestal. He won WPIAL and PIAA titles with Paul Posluszny at Hopewell in 2002. He eventually became the head coach at Seneca Valley for a few years before resigning after 2016. He stayed out of coaching for two years but came back to be part of Lucas’ staff. Vestal still teaches at Hopewell but lives in the West Allegheny district.

“I missed it,” Vestal said. “My wife and I took in a foster son last year and I was able to spend last season helping with his team, but we came to every [West Allegheny] game.”

Another new assistant coach is Darren Schoppe, a former head coach at Bishop Canevin.

Bonding in the mountains

Lucas said one of the best things the team did this summer was spend two days with the coaches at Outdoor Odyssey, an outdoor leadership academy in the hills of Boswell, Pa.

“It’s in the mountains, run by an old Marines general. It teaches you leadership skills through activities,” Lucas said. “When we got there, we took all the players’ cellphones and put them in boxes. We were sitting at dinner and all the coaches were just watching. All the players were just talking. There were no faces down looking at phones. It was the coolest experience.”

This year’s team

West Allegheny lost in the WPIAL Class 5A championship to Penn Hills last year. West Allegheny won the 5A title as recently as 2016.

A number of players from last year’s team graduated, but this team should be highly competitive again. The Indians might look a lot like old West Allegheny teams.

“The defense is the same and even the offense isn’t going to change a whole lot,” Lucas said. “Jamie Schumacher has been here before. I think you may see more read stuff on offense.”

Two QBs?

Palko often used two QBs in games and even sometimes three, using the “wildcat” formation often. Lucas said you’ll probably see two quarterbacks employed again this season. Senior Kam Kruze did some good things last year. Sophomore Gavin Miller has talent and promise. Miller also is one of the best sophomore baseball players in the WPIAL.

“Kruze is more of the dual threat,” Lucas said. “Gavin is an athlete, a young kid who can really throw the ball. He got some time last year. The thing is, Kruze is also an unbelievable receiver. He catches everything.”

Mike White: mwhite@post-gazette.com

First Published: August 7, 2019, 6:30 p.m.

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Chris Lucas is in his first year as coach at West Allegheny, taking over for legendary Bob Palko.  (Steph Chambers/Post-Gazette)
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